Tomorrow is the Democratic primary election in New York state, and I wanted to pass along this piece I wrote for the Huffington Post about why that election has national implications. If you are a New York voter I hope you will take it to heart in your vote for Attorney General tomorrow. And if you know anyone who is a New York voter, I hope you will pass this email on to them.

According to a new poll out over the weekend, the candidate I talk about in the attached article is narrowly ahead – so progressives indeed have a genuine shot to make transformative change. I think if you know my writing and my work that you know I wouldn’t ask that you consider the following article unless I sincerely believed this particular campaign was truly important.

These are but a few names that should remind us of the potential transformative power that some of the more obscure government positions can hold. While our media trains us to obsesses over White House intrigue, public power — i.e. power to shape society, culture, public opinion and policy — is quite often wielded far away from Pennsylvania Avenue’s palace dramas. So when the progressive movement is given the rare opportunity to put one of our own into one of these obscure-but-powerful positions, it is critical to carpe diem.

I write this because on September 14th, one of those opportunities has emerged in the form of Eric Schneiderman. A New York state senator with a stellar track record of movement organizing and progressive legislative achievement, he is suddenly on the verge of winning the Democratic nomination to become his state’s Attorney General — i.e. one of the most powerful economic and social justice policy positions in the entire country.

Among Schneiderman’s claims to fame as a legislator are his seemingly impossible but wildly successful efforts to A) finally reform New York’s abominably draconian Rockefeller Drug Laws and B) pass Ian’s Law — model state legislation that outlaws the most rapacious health insurance industry practices.

Orwell Rolls In His Grave, featuring MCM – Buy the DVD

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News From Underground is a daily e-news service run by Mark Crispin Miller, a Professor of Culture and Communication at NYU. It is based on his belief that academics, like reporters, have a civic obligation to help keep the people well-informed, so that American democracy might finally work.

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